Childhood, Boyhood, Youth

byLeo Tolstoy, Judson Rosengrant (Translator), Judson Rosengrant (Introducer), Judson Rosengrant (Notes by)

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Leo Tolstoy began his trilogy, Childhood, Boyhood, Youth, in his early twenties. Although he would in his old age famously dismiss it as an 'awkward mixture of fact and fiction', generations of readers have not agreed, finding the novel to be a charming and insightful portrait of inner growth against the background of a world limned with extraordinary clarity, grace and colour. Evident too in its brilliant account of a young person's emerging awareness of the world and of his place within it are many of the stances, techniques and themes that would come to full flower in the immortal War and Peace and Anna Karenina, and in the other great works of Tolstoy's maturity.

Tolstoy's first published work, Childhood, is unquestionably one of his most engaging and profound narratives, and he followed it in short order with the other two parts of the trilogy. We have several competent English translations, but none of them comes close to matching Judson Rosengrant's in capturing the young writer's astonishing precision, stylistic variety, and range of moods [...] The introduction breaks new critical ground in presenting Tolstoy's language and thought. The deft, unpretentious annotations are the most thorough in any English-language edition. I cannot think of a better place to start for new readers of Tolstoy, or a more insightful, enjoyable refresher for experienced Tolstoyans
William Mills Todd III, Harvard University

Judson Rosengrant's stunning new translation of Leo Tolstoy's first literary masterpiece reveals the Russian novelist's talent in all its startling and visionary originality [...] Rosengrant's Childhood, Boyhood, Youth is an example of the art of translation at its finest, combining critical acumen, a specialist's understanding of Tolstoy's art, and a profound sympathy with the original's subtle narrative 'moods,' shifting melodies of language, and deployment of stylistic registers. Thanks to Rosengrant's passionate respect for the integrity of the text and the power of the precisely chosen word to illuminate experience, Tolstoy has found an English voice worthy of his own.
Lena M Lencek, Reed College

About Leo Tolstoy

Leo Tolstoy was born in 1828 in the Tula province. He studied at the University of Kazan, then led a life of pleasure until 1851 when he joined an artillery regiment in the Caucasus. He established his reputation as a writer with The Sebastopol Sketches (1855-6). After a period in St Petersburg and abroad, he married, had thirteen children, managed his vast estates in the Volga Steppes and wrote War and Peace (1869) and Anna Karenina (1877). A Confession (1879-82) marked a spiritual crisis in his life, and in 1901 he was excommuincated by the Russian Holy Synod. He died in 1910, in the course of a dramatic flight from home, at the railway station of Astapovo.

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